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Looking for Jack, Ava headed out to the dock where
the Heart of Texas was moored. Sure enough, he was there, with the
engine compartment open, a tool in hand and cussing a blue streak.
"Son of a bitch!" he said, among other things.
"Captain?"
He didn't look up, but continued fooling with the motor. Ava was given
ample opportunity to study his backside, encased in old tight, faded jeans
and a T-shirt that proclaimed, Don't Worry, Go Fishing. She cleared
her throat and tried again. "Jack," she said, louder and more firmly. "I
need to talk to you."
He looked up then. He'd tied a red bandana around his forehead to keep
his hair out of his face. A face now liberally streaked with grease and
dirt. Mystified, she realized again that on him it looked good.
His eyes snapped with impatience. "What about?"
"Our schedule. Remember?"
He muttered something, then went back to the engine. It didn't seem to
dawn on him that she was technically his boss. Or at least, his superior.
"I need to talk to you about our schedule," she repeated.
"Schedule? We don't have one." He spoke to the engine, not her.
Annoyed by now, she said with what she considered admirable restraint,
"What do you mean, we don't have one? Isn't it part of your job description
to take me out on the bay? And if it's not your job, whose is it?"
He grunted as he wrestled some more with the motor. "Yeah, yeah. But
nobody's going anywhere if I can't get this sucker fixed," he said, his back
still to her. "Do something useful and hand me that crescent wrench."
Instead of irritating her, the command amused her. Clearly, here was a
man who didn't cater to anyone. She climbed down into the boat, and looked
at the assortment of tools in the chest and spread over the fiberglass floor
of the cockpit. Since she didn't have a clue what a crescent wrench was, she
picked up a tool at random and slapped it into his open palm, hard.
He grunted something that might have been thanks, started to use the
tool, then looked over his shoulder at her, pinning her with a sharp green
gaze. "This isn't a crescent wrench. It's not even a wrench."
"And I'm not your assistant," she said, her tone deliberately mild.
He stared at her a minute before a reluctant grin transformed his face.
The smile made him look younger, even more handsome and . . . oh, hell, hot.
He turned all the way around and leaned back against the engine, wiping
his arm across his forehead as he did so. "Sorry. I'm a little frustrated.
I've been trying to fix this for most of the day and getting nowhere.
There's not much point in talking about a schedule until the engine is
fixed."
"I had hoped we could have taken a preliminary circuit of the bay, but I
guess that's out of the question today. I didn't realize the boat was out of
commission. I thought it was new."
"Not hardly," he said with a laugh. "Our budget doesn't run to a brand
new research vessel."
She supposed that wasn't a shock. After all, she'd been amazed at the
depth of funding as it was. According to Jared, much of it had come through
private donations. Unfortunately, a good research vessel was a requirement,
not a luxury. "Do you have any idea how long it will take to fix it?"
Because until she had access to the boat she couldn't begin to identify
dolphin.
"A friend of mine's coming to help me in the morning. With luck, by
tomorrow afternoon we'll have it working. I hope." He pulled another bandana
out of his pocket and wiped his face, then looked at her closely, frowning.
"Have we met before?"
"No. Why?"
"You look familiar. Are you sure we've never met?"
Ava laughed. "Can't you do better than that?"
His lips quirked in a smile. "It's not a line. You really do look
familiar. I think it's your eyes."
"They're blue," she said drily. "Lots of people have blue eyes."
He rubbed his nose, spreading more grease. "Not like yours, they don't.
But if you say we've never met I guess I have to believe you." He turned
back to the engine, did something with another tool. "Hot tamale with
chile con queso on top, I think I've done it-"
Ava stepped forward just in time to receive a chest full of motor oil. At
the same time, Jack jumped backward, crashing into her. Her feet slipped out
from under her and she grabbed his arm for balance. They both went down in a
tangle of arms, legs, and heavy duty motor oil.
She could barely breathe. He weighed a ton. "Get off me!" she managed to
squeeze out. She shoved at him ineffectually until a moment later he lifted
himself off her and rolled onto his back.
Ava sat up, grateful that at least the oil had stopped spewing. Viscous,
black liquid lay in small pools on the once white deck. Arm flung across his
eyes, Jack lay on his back laughing, a deep, male sound of pure amusement.
She wanted to kill him. "There's nothing funny about this."
He sat up and grinned at her. "Oh, that's where you're wrong. If you
could see your face-"
Touching a hand to her cheek, she realized the oil had splattered her
face as well as covering her clothes. "What did you think you were doing?"
She looked down at her once white shirt, now liberally streaked with black
and gray. Totally shot. No cleaner in the universe would be able to get that
kind of stain out of a white shirt. "I had to wear my favorite shirt," she
muttered.
"I was trying to fix the engine." He got to his feet and held out a hand.
"Come on, let me help you up."
"Ha. Forget it." She scrambled to her feet with as much dignity as she
could muster.
Which wasn't much since she slipped again and had to grab hold of the
side of the boat to keep from falling. Looking down at her feet, she
realized her shoes, a brand new pair of air- soled running shoes, were a
lost cause as well.
"Look, I'm sorry," Jack said. "It was an accident." His lips quivered but
he controlled the smile, luckily for him. He was just about on her last
nerve.
"How about I-" He broke off as the cell phone clipped to his belt rang.
Or at least, she assumed the sound of the Stone's Satisfaction was
a ring tone and not a radio or CD player suddenly gone berserk.
Frowning at the phone display, he said, "Sorry, I have to take this." He
flipped it open. "Yeah, Williams here." He listened intently for a moment.
"Are you sure he's-He can't-No. No, I understand. I'll be right there."
After he hung up he cussed under his breath, then stood for a moment,
looking grim and staring out at the water. Then he shook his head, closed
the engine compartment and started gathering all the tools together and
tossing them into the open tool box.
It dawned on her he was leaving. "Are you crazy? You can't just go off
and leave the boat in this shape. It's a disaster."
He glanced at her as he chucked the last tool in and closed the lid.
"It'll keep until I can get back to clean up. I'll talk to you later. Right
now, I have to go."
She parked her hands on her hips and stared at him incredulously. "What
can possibly be so important that you'd leave the boat in a mess like this?"
He'd climbed out of the boat by now and stood on the dock looking down at
her. A wry smile twisted his mouth. "My son. That was his school calling to
tell me he's sick. We'll talk tomorrow, okay?" Moments later, he was gone.
His son? So he was married. Be careful what you wish for, she thought. To
be honest, she was a tiny bit disappointed. Which was absurd, considering it
was Jack Williams' fault she was standing on the deck of a nasty, dirty boat
in the ruins of what was once her favorite white shirt and her newest pair
of running shoes.
She looked around, spying a mop and bucket in the corner of the deck. The
man had rushed off to pick up his sick son. Though she tried to keep it
under wraps, Ava had a soft spot for a man who'd drop everything to take
care of his child. She sighed and removed her shoes, setting them on the
dock. She couldn't make the boat spotless but she could clean up the worst
of the mess. Jack could do the rest tomorrow.
And, she thought philosophically, Jack Williams would definitely owe her
for this. Which could only help, all things considered.
Excerpt from REMEMBER TEXAS, copyright 2006 by
Eve Gaddy, Harlequin Superromance #1367, August 2006.
You can order from Eve Gaddy's currently
available titles at Author,
Author! or Amazon.
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